I'm a democrat. I've been active in various elections and less so in others.
But it's harder and harder to stay on the team.
Sometimes my party feels like republican-lite.
My friend Jason sent me a link to the current article running in the Nation called Hillary Inc.
Worth reading the full piece if you are a struggling democrat looking for a 2008 candidate.
I've copied the first few paragraphs here for your easy reading
In a packed ballroom in midtown Manhattan, Hillary Clinton is
addressing hundreds of civil rights activists and labor leaders
convened by the Rev. Al Sharpton for his annual National Action Network
conference. The junior senator from New York starts slowly but picks up
steam when she hits on the economic anxiety many in the room feel.
"We're not making progress," she says, her sharp Midwestern monotone
accented with a bit of Southern twang. "Wages are flat." Nods of
agreement. "This economy is not working!" Applause. She's not quite the
rhetorical populist her husband was on the campaign trail, but she can
still feel your pain. "Everything has been skewed," Clinton says,
jabbing her index finger for emphasis, "to help the privileged and the
powerful at the expense of everybody else!"
It's a rousing speech, though ultimately not very convincing. If
Clinton really wanted to curtail the influence of the powerful, she
might start with the advisers to her own campaign, who represent some
of the weightiest interests in corporate America. Her chief strategist,
Mark Penn, not only polls for America's biggest companies but also runs
one of the world's premier PR agencies. A bevy of current and former
Hillary advisers, including her communications guru, Howard Wolfson,
are linked to a prominent lobbying and PR firm--the Glover Park
Group--that has cozied up to the pharmaceutical industry and Rupert
Murdoch. Her fundraiser in chief, Terry McAuliffe, has the priciest
Rolodex in Washington, luring high-rolling contributors to Clinton's
campaign. Her husband, since leaving the presidency, has made millions
giving speeches and counsel to investment banks like Goldman Sachs and
Citigroup. They house, in addition to other Wall Street firms, the
Clintons' closest economic advisers, such as Bob Rubin and Roger
Altman, whose DC brain trust, the Hamilton Project, is Clinton's
economic team in waiting. Even the liberal in her camp, former deputy
chief of staff Harold Ickes, has lobbied for the telecom and healthcare
industries, including a for-profit nursing home association indicted in
Texas for improperly funneling money to disgraced former House majority
leader Tom DeLay. "She's got a deeper bench of big money and corporate
supporters than her competitors," says Eli Attie, a former speechwriter
to Vice President Al Gore. Not only is Hillary more reliant on large
donations and corporate money than her Democratic rivals, but advisers
in her inner circle are closely affiliated with unionbusters, GOP
operatives, conservative media and other Democratic Party antagonists.
Recent Comments